RIL to invest Rs 1.8 lakh crore in three years

Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani, left and his wife Nita Ambani arrive for the company's annual general meeting in Mumbai. (AP Photo)

Reliance Industries, India's third-largest company by market value, today said it will invest Rs 1.8 lakh crore ($30.2 billion) across businesses in the next three years and launch the much-awaited 4G broadband services in 2015 as it looks to break-into top 50 companies of the world.

RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani, the world's richest energy billionaire, unveiled his vision to achieve in next three years what the firm had done in 37 years of its listed history.

Addressing the 40th annual general meeting of RIL, Ambani said Rs 1,80,000 crore will be invested in margin-enhancing petrochem units, expansion of energy business, opening more retail stores and roll-out of telecom business.

RIL's telecom arm Reliance Jio Infocomm, which is the only company to have nationwide permits for 4G services, will start rolling out broadband services in the coming months.

It will begin with field trials in August and commercial launch in 2015, he said.

Ambani said the company, which last fiscal became the biggest retailer in the country by revenue, is aiming doubling revenue from its retail business every 3-4 years.

While it looks to raising output from its eastern offshore gas fields, RIL will in 2015-16 begin extracting gas from coal seams (coal-bed methane or CBM) from Sohagpur blocks in Madhya Pradesh, Ambani said.

His mother Kokila Ambani, wife Nita Ambani and children were also present on the occasion.

RIL, which is currently ranked 135 on the Fortune 500 list of global companies, is looking at breaking into the top 50, Ambani said.

Meanwhile, Nita Ambani was today inducted into the company board.

Last year, Ambani had said Reliance would invest more than 1.5 trillion rupees over three years.